Shackled
by TheWeatherOutside
Summary: Rescues are hard when evil lies around every corner. (Day 9 of Whumptober 2019 - Shackled)


_This is the first part of a two part series. Next part will come out tomorrow (Day 10 of Whumptober)._

* * *

Gordon stretched as they got the last of the victims from their latest rescue out of the collapsed cave and prepared to gather up their equipment before they headed home.

All-in-all, the rescue had gone as straight forward as it could have. They had been called out after a small group of people had gone exploring in one of the local caves, and not long into their adventure the entrance to the cave had collapsed and they had no way to get out on their own. So, Virgil and Gordon had shown up in Thunderbird 2 and gotten the group out with their own equipment. Now, the group were being taken in by the local emergency services as the two of them packed up their equipment.

However, what still didn't make much sense was how that cave had collapsed in the first place. These caves were a frequent hotspot for explorers to spend their time in. They were supposed to have been structurally intact with no problem of collapsing, no one had ever had a problem before.

It wasn't so much that fact that had the brothers questioning the situation, though. Caves collapsed all the time; it didn't matter how fractured they seemed beforehand. It was actually the fact that the group had mentioned how the ground had shaken before the cave had begun to collapse. Also, a couple of them had sworn they had heard an explosion in the distance beforehand.

John had done some scans of the area and no seismic activity had come up, so the shaking couldn't have been an earthquake. And, the caves were in a rather rural area- there wasn't much around that could have exploded.

Despite all of that, the explorers had been rescued swiftly and without any hassle. Everybody was safe, and even though they didn't get to the bottom of the situation, there wasn't much they could do about it now. Virgil and Gordon were free to leave.

That was until John had decided to chime in.

"Sorry to prolong the rescue, but my scanners are picking up some more life signs in the cave."

Virgil and Gordon glanced at each other, both sharing a confused look between them.

"The explorers said we had got out all of their group," Virgil frowned. "Do you think there was another group in there?"

"I'm not sure. They've only just showed up on my scanners, although I'm not sure why they've only just appeared."

"Just another mystery with this whole rescue," Gordon said from where he had just thrown some tools into one of the boxes in TB2's module.

"They don't look like they're that far into the cave, though. They're probably just a bit lost, you might be good to just head on in without needing to dig them out first."

Gordon made his way out of the module and gave Virgil's shoulder a pat as he passed by. "Don't worry, Virg. I'll get them."

"You're just offering because you don't want to clean up," Virgil called after him, but didn't stop him as he headed back towards the cave.

"Exactly!" Gordon yelled back, and he threw on his helmet as he entered the cave.

John had sent the location of the life signs to Gordon, and so he headed towards where they were in the cave. So far, the tunnels that Gordon had been down had been intact. It seemed that the only part that had collapsed was the entrance, which thankfully meant that Gordon didn't need to head back for any equipment to dig his way through.

Once Gordon had reached roughly where the small group of people should be, he started to call out for them.

"Hello? Is anyone there? This is International Rescue!"

A couple of minutes went by, but no matter how much Gordon called out, he still hadn't heard anyone reply. He frowned as he looked down to the small hologram of the cave that had popped up from his wrist. According to the map, he was right where the life signs were, but there was no one around and no one was replying so he couldn't find out where they were.

He was about to contact John to see if he could rescan the area, or if he knew why there seemed to be no sign of anyone, but then something coming from Gordon's right caught his attention.

It was dark in the cave, so the only light that Gordon had was the one in his helmet. The lack of light meant that Gordon couldn't quite see all of his surroundings, and he almost missed the narrow tunnel that branched off of the cavern he was currently walking through. He would have missed it, if it wasn't for the light that suddenly appeared at the end of the tunnel.

Gordon relaxed slightly as he thought that that must be the explorers that he was looking for and headed towards the light.

The tunnel was much narrower than it initially looked, and as Gordon just about squeezed through it, he hoped that the people he was rescuing weren't injured. It was going to be a lot of hassle trying to get someone through here if they needed to be carried or something.

At the end of the tunnel there was a sharp turn, and then it opened up into a wide cavern. Gordon stepped into the cavern and looked around. He grew confused when all he saw was a torch lying in the middle of the ground. At least he knew where the light had been coming from, but there didn't appear to be anyone around.

Gordon walked over to the torch and bent down to pick it up. Maybe someone had been hurrying through here and had dropped it on the way? But the light had only just appeared, so wouldn't that person still be nearby? No one had replied when he had called out before, but maybe if they were down here, they hadn't heard him. Or maybe they did but had gotten scared and ran off.

Gordon thought he should try calling out again before he searched for another tunnel that this person could have gone down, but before he could open his mouth, he felt a pain in his leg as someone came up behind him and kicked the back of his knee. The kick had sent him to the floor and the torch fell out of his hands.

Then, there were hands grabbing him and pulling his helmet off. He heard the helmet clatter to the floor as his arms were pulled behind his back and a hand was roughly placed over his mouth. He tried to struggle out of the hands that had a tight grip on his arms, but then was stopped short as an all-too-familiar voice rose up out of the dark edges of the cave.

"Looks like the mouse fell right into the trap."

Gordon's heart raced as the Hood stepped out of the shadows and began to approach him.

"You sure did take your time. I'm on a tight schedule here, and I had to wait for you to arrive before I could leave."

Gordon tried to say something as he struggled against his restraints again, but anything that came out of his mouth was muffled by the hand over his face.

The Hood was now standing in front of him, his hand's clasped behind his back. "Now, now, there's no need to panic. As long as you don't make a fuss, you'll get out of this alive. All I need from you is to be a distraction so that I can get away before your brothers notice that I'm here."

_Distraction? What was that supposed to-_

The Hood looked towards someone who was standing behind Gordon, and a moment later they stepped into Gordon's line of sight. It was then that Gordon noticed the chains that the man was holding, and his eyes went wide and his breathing started to quicken as he realised what it was for.

He struggled harder as the man came forward and reached for his arms behind his back. However, the people who were holding him were too strong and they barely budged, so he did all that he could think of. He bit the hand that was clasped over his mouth.

The owner of the hand howled in pain and let him go. They went to cradle their hand, and in doing so one of Gordon's arms fell free. Now that he had a bit more leeway, he went to yank his other arm free, but the man holding the chain saw what he was about to do and put a stop to it by punching him across the face.

He was stunned for a moment and then there was something touching his neck. The next thing he knew, there was pain coursing throughout his body as bolts of electricity were sent through him. He fell to the floor and couldn't even stop the men as they tied the cold, metal chains around Gordon's wrists and ankles.

Through Gordon's blurry, pain-filled vision he could just about make out the Hood as he came close and bent down to look at him.

"It's a pity you didn't put up much of a fight. That was quite entertaining to watch."

He stood up straight again and turned away. He made his way to the other side of the cavern where another one of his henchmen were waiting, and that was when Gordon noticed the other tunnel that lead into the cave.

"I'm sure we'll meet again, that's if you survive the blast," the Hood said as he turned to look at Gordon once more before he headed off down the tunnel.

His other henchmen soon followed after, and Gordon's heart sank as he realised what the Hood meant. Before the last man left the cavern, he bent down to place something right in the entrance of the tunnel. A small, flashing light showed up and it began to beep, and Gordon recognised it as some sort of explosive.

He tried to sit up quickly, but it was hard as he was laying on his front with his hands tied behind his back. Not to mention the pain that still coursed through his body, although that had settled a bit.

He pushed up on his shoulder and he tried to shuffle his knees beneath himself. Soon he was in a good enough position push himself up until he was kneeling. Once he was up, he noticed that there was another flashing light coming from the same tunnel that he had entered through, and he quickly turned his head to find that one of those men had also placed another explosive there.

It didn't take long for Gordon to piece together that they were trying to blow the only exits out of the cave so that they would collapse, and Gordon wouldn't be able to escape. That thought made Gordon struggle against the chains more, but it was so no avail. He couldn't even reach his comms to let his brothers know about the Hood.

Gordon frantically looked between both entrances, wondering if he would be about to hop over to either of them with his ankles tied and before the explosives went off.

It seemed that fate wanted to make his decision for him, though, as before Gordon could do anything else, both bombs exploded and sent the cave tumbling in on itself.

_Concluded in Day 10 of Whumptober._


End file.
